THE NEW YORKER good at that, either. There was a toll bridge in our town, and the squire had leased it to a thickheaded youth, Leibush Cudgel. The peasants and wagon drivers who crossed the bridge had to pay two groschen each. It was considered a lowly way to earn a liv- ing. The peasants would look for ways to get out of paying There was another bridge, at some distance, and many went across there. Leibush was dishonest; he cheated the squire, and was finally dismissed. Suddenly, the news got around that Mully had taken over the toll bridge. It was a disgrace. Lifshe stopped going out in public and turned into a recluse. Reb Shachne said to the rabbi, 'I must have done something wrong to deserve such shame.' The whole thing was bizarre. When peasants looked at the young city slicker, all dressed up, they became abusive. One tried to get out of paying altogether, another said he'd pay to- morrow, later. One ruffian lashed at Mully with his whip. "Everyone waited for the couple to divorce. But you never know what goes on inside someone else's head. All of a sudden, word spread that Gneshe, in her blond wig, was sitting in the toll booth and collecting the tolls. I couldn't believe my ears, and went to see for myself. My dear people, Gneshe, already big with child, had put on a heavy vest with a deep pocket, like a market woman's, and had come out to help her husband at the toll booth. The peasants yelled at her and she yelled back. They cursed her and she cursed them. A small crowd had gathered. Some laughed and some pinched their cheeks in dismay. Some- one said that a dybbuk had entered Gneshe. A woman ran to Lifshe with the bad tidings, and Lifshe said, 'I'm already dead and buried.' "I t wasn't long before she did breathe her last. Reb Shachne suffered on for another two years, but he be- came so emaciated that his clothes hung on him. Gneshe had already picked a fight with her parents, and had moved out of their house. She seldom came to see her mother during her illness This was not the same Gneshe Her eyes were always angry. Her child, a boy, was born after Lif- she's death. My mother had gone to see Lifshe when she was ill, and tried to comfort her. After all, she said, Gneshe had not killed anyone. But Lifshe said to my mother, 'This is not my daughter, it's some kind of trans- /} í j ]V1 //;1 t/ i/( . figuration.' A few days before Lifshe's death, her son, T evel, came to visit her, and he stayed until the thirty days of mourning were over. He said openly that he didn't recognize his sis- ter. "I forgot the most important thing. Gneshe had become a devoted wife to M ully, or so it seemed. He tried his hand at all kinds of businesses and she was always there at his side. The truth is, by himself he failed at everything. When she said buy, he bought, and when she said sell, he sold. He spouted mindless jokes and she laughed and asked to hear them again. If she, Gneshe the wise, had made a mistake, then she had to prove that it was right. It's an arrogance of sorts. She didn't let anyone say a bad word about Mully. She bore him four children. Except for the firstborn, all were girls, and they all took after their father: good-looking but silly. Gneshe bragged about how smart they were, but when she scolded them she would shriek that they were nitwits like their father. A neighbor of hers, who liked to eavesdrop at night from behind the 39 ---r YD V {( Cl-ltC KÎ J 5 11'/ j Tt+EMAIL I . shutters, told it to me. The children were petrified of Gneshe. If they didn't do exactly as she ordered, she'd whip them. "Gneshe was a good business- woman, and she soon began to do well. It was said that Reb Shachne had left three-quarters of his fortune to char- ity, but it seems that Gneshe had found his will and burned it, and what remained was a previous will, in which Reb Shachne left almost every- thing to her. All her brother got was books, a scroll, a spice box, and other such things. There is a saying: Husband and wife sleep so long on the same pillow their heads become the same. In later years, Gneshe be- gan to make jokes, too-not as fool- ish as Mully's but too many, and in the same manner. She even began to look like him-still handsome but cheap. " 1 HAD already moved away when Mully died-struck down like a felled tree. Gneshe wailed and la- mented, bought a plot for him in the most expensive part of the cemetery,